Suzhou weekend. Hefei tomorrow.

Had spend a great weekend in Suzhou, many thanks to Aaron. It has almost become his part time job to host friends visiting Suzhou. But I doubt it's a dull one since Suzhou is beautiful, interesting, and ever-changing.

Besides the famous Suzhou Gardens and stately homes of ancient rulers, we visited newer areas such as 新加坡苏州工业园区. The residential developments here are a sharp contrast to the "City" (as defined by the "River" -- 河内环), where no high rise is allowed, and where for new buildings, roofs are black, and walls white, to be consistent with the existing style.

A night cruise along the encircling river reveals that the Suzhou government had put their rich tax inflow to good use, and resulted in scenery soon to be envied by visitors around the world ("soon" because still not done rebuilding). Ancient city walls and gates were moved to more convenient location for sake of city planning and better viewing; bridges (there were so, so many) and trees decorated with nice lighting -- Clearly this is no small operation.

The tail of the wealth distribution in this city had gotten a lot fatter since my last visit a few years ago. The government's strategy of building highways had paid of in many ways. In terms of land mass, half of greater suzhou seems to be centered around the new modern factories. Japanese, German, American, Singaporean, and, especially, Taiwanese money are all over this place. With cash comes a new generation of expats, and with that fancy bars, clubs, restaurants, resorts, golf courses -- you name it. It seems eminent that the empty space between Shanghai and Suzhou will be filled in not so many years in the horizon.

The weekend escapade ended with a trip to Tongli (同里), where beside the 2 hour long walk in this well preserved ancient village, a more substantive gain presided -- the purchase of famous local pork hocks (状元蹄膀). I pick out a nice looking foot, had it vacuum packaged on the spot. Today, in Nanjing, I had it for lunch. Fat as it was, it was quite tasty.

This afternoon I took a local bus (游1线) to the Presidential Palace of the former Republic of China, of which Nanjing was the capital city, and Sun Yat-sen was the president. And afterward I went to the burial grounds of Mr. Sun (中山陵). Unfortunately I haven't got much insight into these 2 experience due to my scanty knowledge of Chinese history (especially the contemporary complications), except to say that the KMT (Kuo-Ming-Tang, 国民党) flag was cleverly concealed as an inconspicuous existence, presiding over the body of Sun. Another interesting thought is that although Taiwanese hail Sun as the founding father (国父), I wonder if he's ever been to Taiwan.

Tomorrow, I'm going to take a 3 hour bus to Hefei (in Anhui Province) to visit my Aunt. Hopefully I won't get mugged, as in the unsavory tales I've heard.